5. Impact of the Severe Weather

The winter of 2009/10 caused more damage to the road network than normal with a resulting increase in public compensation claims and payouts. Extensive additional patching was required just to hold some roads together but any increase in reactive maintenance budgets was generally at the expense of structural maintenance programmes. It is anticipated that the very worst affected roads will be resurfaced this year but this means that many others that are in need of urgent resurfacing will either be surface dressed instead or left to deteriorate due to insufficient budgets. This increased burden has to be added to the considerable increased cost of winter maintenance itself. On trunk roads the increased cost of dealing with the winter is met by the trunk road operating companies who are paid on a fixed lump sum.

Sudden melting of snow brings with it the potential for significant flooding. Although limited, this also tested the well planned arrangements in place for such events around Scotland.